Work Text:
AUGUST
Alex doesn’t necessarily need a job—a full course load (plus some) is more than enough to fill his time—but his coffee habit could use a few extra dollars. Really, it’s June’s fault, a fact he likes pointing out any time she tries to yell at him for something, like serving uncooked garlic bread, or accidentally making a grown man cry, or breaking public indecency laws with one of the restaurant’s regulars. They each happened once, June, and no one got seriously injured.
(One of those things definitely happens more than once, but that’s not important to the argument.)
Since starting law school, he hasn't had much of a social life, outside of a few departmental socials, a handful of hookups back when he still went out to the local bars, and an accidental crashing of a book club once. While working one day a week at a local restaurant isn’t exactly a social life per se, it does qualify as basic social interaction, so when June tells him D’Amico’s is looking for help, particularly on their Thursday Spaghetti Special night, he halfheartedly agrees.
Thus begins his love story.
:
When he walks into the restaurant for the first time to fill out an application, he almost walks right back out. It’s a plain, nondescript brick building from the outside with a few narrow windows barely able to let much light in. Whatever purpose it was originally built for, it was surely not a restaurant.
Walking in the front door, the first thing he sees is a small wall painted three different colors, like maybe they were testing a few shades but then forgot halfway through. Turning the corner, he almost walks straight into the host stand and the bored teenager playing on their phone. They don’t even glance up to acknowledge him, so after hovering briefly, Alex decides to bypass them altogether.
Behind the stand is a large bar with absolutely no cohesion. Part of the backsplash has a mirror, part is a collage of brightly colored tiles, and the remainder is just floral wallpaper. He wonders if they could only afford a portion of the wall and instead of saving up cash, they thought fuck it, and just did what they could.
And to the left of that is the dining room. It’s—a lot. It’s a pretty decent size, definitely bigger on the inside, with at least forty tables crammed in. There are booths lined along both side walls and smaller booths lined along the back. Rows of tables sit in between, mismatched sizes, shapes, and colors. Some of the hanging lights seem to be working, but others aren’t. He's not sure if the mood lighting is intentional or if it's due to faulty wiring and burnt-out light bulbs, but he has a hunch.
He debates leaving and going home to watch some Bake Off on his laptop, but the more he looks around, the more he realizes it’s kind of…charming. Judging from the takeout June has brought home occasionally after a shift, he knows the food is good (and cheap), and she still hasn’t quit, so the staff must be pretty decent, too.
So why the hell not.
While he’s looking around, the bartender finally notices him, and three minutes later, Alex is standing in front of the owner of the restaurant, a small, unassuming older Italian woman. He doesn’t get interviewed, and he doesn’t fill out an application. Instead, she takes a photocopy of his license and hands him a black apron. He assumes the copy of his license is for legal employment paycheck purposes but he makes a mental note to keep an eye on his credit report.
Seven minutes after stepping through the door, he has a job. Ms. D’Amico said a handful of words (“are you convicted of a crime”), the bartender simply asked his name (“Are you Andrew?”), and the host didn’t acknowledge his presence whatsoever. It’s not the best beginning to his ultimate goal of basic social interaction, but it’s a start.
:
On his first day, he’s given a notepad and told to shadow June for the night. He fidgets with his white collared shirt and wonders, not for the first time, why servers at an Italian restaurant wear white shirts as part of their uniform. He’s not sure how long it’ll take to spill marinara on himself (four minutes), or accidentally dunk a sleeve into a bucket of garlic butter (nineteen minutes), or dump a ladle full of homemade ranch directly into the pocket of his apron (thirty-four minutes), but he’s pretty confident Shout wipes aren't going to cut it when he inevitably does.
After she briefly introduces him to the staff, June leads him out through the kitchen doors to the dining room. There is an Out and an In, and June makes sure to explicitly point this out, as if Alex doesn’t have basic reading comprehension skills, despite being the top student in every class he’s ever taken.
“Thursdays are the busiest day, hence the presence of basically the entire staff,” she says. “Spaghetti, salad or soup, a piece of garlic bread, and a non-alcoholic beverage for four fifty.”
“Four fifty? Jesus, how do you even make money?”
Instead of answering, she gives him a serious look. “One piece of garlic bread, Alex. This place doesn’t have many rules outside of following most basic health code regulations, but garlic bread is the exception.”
Alex frowns at ‘most.’
“After that, each piece of garlic bread is fifty cents.” Her tone is no-nonsense, and pay-per-piece garlic bread is so far the weirdest thing about this place, which is saying something. The profit margin on that has to be pretty significant.
“Okay, noted, God,” he says as she glares at him. “I’m not going to just go around giving free garlic bread.”
(He does.)
“You’ll eventually get the regulars, so time for background,” she starts, then points to an older couple by the front door. “The Johnsons. Same table every week. Early birds. The special starts at four and they’re here ready to go at 3:55. Nice enough, but the tip is the balance of a ten.”
Alex does the quick math. “A dollar?” he asks incredulously. “They leave a dollar?”
She shrugs. “I mean, it is what it is.”
“How the fuck are you supposed to survive on a dollar?”
“Turnover,” she explains. “No one stays too long, so when you get thirty tables leaving a couple of dollars, it adds up.”
“Sixty dollars is like, ten dollars an hour, June.”
“You could always work more than once a week,” she says pointedly.
He ignores her. “Keep going.”
“Mr. Roberts,” she says, nodding her head in the direction of a middle-aged man, spoon hovering in front of his mouth.
“Is he eating parmesan cheese out of the shaker?” Alex asks blankly. He tries not to judge anyone’s life’s choices, but unscrewing a shaker to eat spoonfuls of powdered cheese out of it is next level.
June shrugs again. “You get used to it. He eats the cheese, we replace it with one from the back, and stick the empty one in the dishwasher. We keep it hygienic.”
“I’m not questioning the lifecycle of the cheese shaker, Jesus Christ. I’m asking about the grown man shoveling powdered cheese into his mouth.”
“We charge him a cheese tax,” she answers, as if that makes up for it. She’s so casual about seeing a human cheese shovel that Alex can only wonder what customers give her pause.
“What is a cheese tax—”
“That’s Henry,” she continues, ignoring him. Alex decides not to push the issue, but he has many follow-up questions. He follows her gaze and sees—
Oh. A man who looks very out of place at a small, sorta-sketchy family-owned Italian restaurant presumably funded by cheese tax and garlic bread overages. He’s blond with cheekbones so prominent Alex can see them from twenty feet away. He’s wearing a striped button-up under a green sweater, and he looks…soft. Alex frowns to himself because that’s an adjective he’s never applied to another man. Or any human, really. It’s a weird adjective, objectively.
He realizes June is still talking. “—good tipper, super polite and sweet, always orders a tea, never gets the special. Sometimes he shows up on other days, but he’s always here on Thursdays. I don’t understand how he writes with all the noise, but.”
At that, Alex notices the open notebook sitting next to Henry’s plate with a pen and phone neatly placed atop. He wonders what Henry writes. He kinda wants to ask him.
The cheese shaker on his table is untouched, so Alex thinks it’s probably safe to assume there will be no cheese tax on his bill.
He snaps back to attention as June describes two more regulars not pictured: a family of four who all get orange soda and spill a good three-fourths on the table and/or floor and/or napkin dispenser, and two women who come in after a weekly manicure to order drinks but refuse to sit at the bar.
After, June gives him a quick tour of the kitchen, the storage room, the coolers, the ‘garlic butter’ station where they prepare the garlic bread for the day, the back alley where he sees a few smokers milling around, and the server station in the back of the main dining room that houses things like to-go containers and a soda fountain. He learns how to hang the orders for the front-line cooks and log in to the computer and make side salads and carry sodas on a tray. It’s all pretty simple. Should be easy. Effortless.
:
His first Thursday is the opposite of effortless. Alex only has a few tables, one of which is Margot and Margot, the two post-manicure martini drinkers. Apparently taking up a booth for hours and not ordering any food is a tactless thing to do, but he couldn’t be more grateful to have one table to barely worry about.
(Barely worrying about tables becomes a pretty defining trait.)
He learns how quickly people eat their food and drink their water. He learns how many crumbs make up a piece of garlic bread, and how many of them fall off during consumption. He learns that he'd rather clean up said crumbs than watch a grown man eat them directly off the table. He learns how many shards of glass are produced when one drops a water glass on a tiled floor, and he witnesses the velocity of the iced tea that was once in it. He learns the shape and size of the bruise that comes from a toddler’s projectile sippy cup.
He learns Henry comes in around five, and he learns what Henry’s smile looks like when they make brief eye contact.
:
He starts to sort of get the hang of things after that. Admittedly, though, getting the hang of things is not quite the same as being good at things.
Nora is the one who has to teach him how to add cheese tax to a bill on week three. Alex cannot even slightly wrap his head around any of it—how many buttons he has to press just to add a cheese tax, how a grown man chooses to pay cheese tax when bringing in his own store-bought container would be just as expensive, or how a cheese tax was born in the first place. It predates everyone who currently works at the restaurant, so Alex resigns himself to just never knowing.
:
Henry doesn't have a usual table like most other regulars do, so it’s not until the end of Alex’s first month that Henry’s even sat in his section.
The Johnson couple always sit at the smallest table at the front of the dining room, probably because they’re expedient and it’s the closest to both the register and the door; Mr. Roberts and his cheese are always in one of the four large booths on the far wall; the Margots sit in any free corner booth; and the Martinez family always sit at one of the two large round tables, which provide ample space for the pools of orange soda.
But Henry never sits anywhere specific. He even occasionally sits in one of the small two-tops that probably don’t give him enough room to write, or in the handful of booths without functional overhead lighting. So, for some reason, by the time Henry is finally at one of his tables, Alex is oddly looking forward to it. He's wanted to meet this famous Henry everyone loves. Maybe ask about what he's writing.
“Henry, right?” he asks in lieu of ‘hello’ as he reaches the table.
Henry startles and looks up to meet Alex’s eyes. He immediately fumbles with his notebook, shutting it so quickly that his pen almost goes flying.
“Oh hey, sorry, man,” Alex says. “Didn’t mean to scare you.”
“Oh. You. I. No,” Henry says stiffly, and Alex is a bit taken aback because, from a distance, Henry looks a lot smarter than someone who communicates via monosyllabic not-sentences.
“‘No’?” Alex asks. “No what?”
Henry shakes his head. “I didn’t mean no,” he says, almost cringing, and Alex is relieved that he knows how to formulate sentences. “I meant…hello.”
“Okay,” Alex says slowly. “Hello.”
Henry does nothing but stare at him, and this might be one of the weirdest interactions Alex has had so far. And one of the owner’s grandsons speaks in Pig Latin for fun, so.
“I’m Alex,” he says carefully. Henry is sort of looking at him like a spooked animal.
“I kn—yes, nice to meet you,” he replies. “I’ll take a tea please.”
It’s abrupt and short, and Alex makes a mental note to check with June because he swears she said Henry was nice.
“Yeah, okay,” Alex says, eyeing him. “Do you know what you want, or…”
“Oh,” Henry answers, like maybe he forgot he was in a restaurant. “Er—pasta primavera?”
“Is that a…question?” Alex asks him.
“No,” Henry tells him decisively. “Pasta primavera. Italian dressing. Hot tea. Thank you.”
It feels weirdly brusque, and it’s almost disheartening that someone so attractive is so dismissive.
Wait—what. Did June call him attractive? She must have.
“Yeah, okay,” Alex says, giving him one final look.
June happens to be filling the lettuce tray when Alex goes to assemble Henry’s salad. “I thought you said this guy was nice,” he grumbles.
“Who?” she asks, wiping her hands on her apron.
“Henry,” he answers. “The hot tea guy.”
“Oh my god, Alex,” she says in a tone that indicates she’s disappointed but not surprised. “How did you possibly offend the nicest person I know this quickly into your shift?”
“Nice?” Alex asks, sprinkling the cheese on top. “He’s barely said ten words. And some of those words—”
“I don’t even want to know,” June says, straight up walking away while he’s mid-sentence.
When Alex drops off his salad later, Henry’s hand is placed protectively on top of his notebook like he thinks Alex is going to forcibly remove it from him, and he realizes he forgot the dressing in the back. “Oh, fuck. I forgot your dressing. Be right back,” he says. Henry doesn’t comment on the profanity or even seem to react to it at all.
But he’s not right back. One of his tables flags him down for more napkins—he just filled that dispenser fifteen minutes ago; how many could they possibly have used?—and another for some pay-per-piece garlic bread. When he does a brief drive-by five minutes later, he notices someone dropped off Henry’s pasta pomodoro, but his salad is still untouched. “Fuck, your dressing,” he sighs.
On his way back to the kitchen, he grabs Mr. Johnson’s cheese shaker, two empty orange soda glasses, and three empty salad dishes. While dropping everything off at the industrial dishwasher, he manages to spray himself in the face with the water sprayer, and he’s forced to unbutton the top three buttons of his shirt to wipe away dishwater before letting the rest air dry.
Jesus Christ, how is he still employed. He’s on track to become a badass civil rights attorney but he can’t operate a dishwasher that the owner’s grandkid easily maneuvers with his left hand while watching YouTube videos on the phone in his right.
It’s not until he’s dropping off a to-go container for Henry’s pasta that he realizes his salad is still dressing-free.
“Shit,” he says. “Let me go—”
“It’s fine,” Henry says, waving him off, not looking up while spooning his pasta into the container—wait did he order primavera? “It’s tomorrow’s lunch.”
“Are you sure?” Alex says. “I’m sorry, man.”
Henry seems unbothered, but when Alex drops off a to-go cup of the dressing with his bill, he won’t even look Alex in the eye. Instead, his eyes catch at the top of Alex’s collared shirt where the undone buttons are probably showcasing dishwater remnants on his collarbone and upper chest. He’s not sure the stare is warranted; it’s not like dishwater is unhygienic or anything. Maybe unprofessional, but no more so than the garlic butter on both sleeves or his f-bomb free-for-all.
When he’s running Henry’s credit card, he realizes maybe the garlic butter sleeves are a bit tacky, so he rolls them up to his elbows. Henry can’t possibly be judgy about garlic butter cuffs if there aren’t any visible cuffs to judge. But he’s wrong, apparently, because when Alex drops off the receipt for him to sign, Henry’s eyes dart between the garlic butter forearms and dishwater collarbone, and Alex swears he hears a faint “Fucking Christ.”
When Alex goes to pick up the credit card receipt of the allegedly nice guy and good tipper and attractive blond (June called him that, right?), there’s no tip. There’s nothing written in the dotted TIP line. Just a signature at the bottom of the receipt.
Henry fucking stiffed him.
SEPTEMBER
He spends most of the following Thursday aggressively glaring at Henry and being not at all subtle about it. Alex avoids the table completely because the things he wants to say will undoubtedly get him fired.
Henry looks confused but doesn’t say anything, much less apologize.
:
The week after that, Alex ignores Henry every time he has to walk by his table and rolls his eyes at how quickly Henry closes his notebook each time. Like he even cares about what Henry is writing anymore.
(He does.)
Three separate times Henry looks like he’s going to say something, but he never does.
:
Another Thursday, more aggressive glaring. Alex spends half of his shift thinking about all of the things he would say to Henry if he was allowed. Not that he’s even had the chance; Henry hasn’t been in his section for three weeks.
He can feel Henry’s eyes on him, but whenever Alex turns to meet his eyes with more glowering, Henry’s back to writing.
:
By the time he does get a chance to wait on Henry, he’s spent a month fuming and he’s ready to unload his fury.
“Hello, Alex,” Henry says as Alex approaches his table, a cautious tone to his voice. He carefully closes his notebook.
“Hello, Henry,” he says back. “Such a pleasure to see you in our fine establishment tonight.” Apparently he’s chosen passive-aggression over fury.
Henry gives him a quizzical look. “Er—yes. Pleasure to see you as well.”
Alex narrows his eyes at what can only be sarcasm. How does Henry have so many people fooled that he’s some nice guy?
Henry stares at him, eyebrows furrowed. He moves his mouth like he’s trying to find the right words before settling on: “Have I done something wrong?”
Alex scoffs and rolls his eyes. “Tea?” he asks.
“I’ll take that as a yes then.”
“Tea?” he repeats.
“Could you perhaps elaborate?”
“Elaborate?” Alex asks. “It’s fucking tea, Henry. How the hell do you want me to elaborate?” He’s fairly confident that swearing at customers is frowned upon, and he’s even more confident that the excuse of ‘he deserved it’ is enough for immediate dismissal.
“Elaborate on what I’ve done wrong.” He looks so earnest that Alex almost buys it.
“Oh, I don’t know, maybe because you stiffed me for forgetting your dressing once,” (twice), “and made me feel like total shit?”
Henry’s mouth falls open. “Oh God, I didn’t tip you? I hadn’t realized—why didn’t you say something sooner?”
He looks genuinely apologetic, and Alex deflates a little. “What the hell was I supposed to say? ‘Sorry I forgot your dressing once,”—twice—“but it seems a bit disproportionate to leave me zero dollars’?”
Henry immediately fumbles for his wallet and pulls out a twenty, trying to shove it at Alex. “I’m so sorry, here. I was…distracted and wasn’t thinking. Truly, I’m sorry.”
“I don’t need your pity money, Henry,” he bites out, feeling irrationally defensive.
Henry rolls his eyes, still holding out the cash. “First you’re angry because I didn’t leave any money, and now you’re angry because I’m giving you money? Christ, Alex, take it.”
He hesitates. A twenty is, like, a two-hundred percent tip. The homemade salad dressing (and/or the server who forgot to provide it) isn’t worth a twenty. “Fine, but I’m still mad,” Alex tells him, without any heat behind it, as he reaches out to take the money.
“Of course you are,” Henry says, ducking his head to try to hide a smile.
“Okay,” Alex says lamely. He feels a little unsettled now that he doesn’t have his anger fueling him. “Well. I’ll just get your tea then.”
Henry quietly says, “Will you.” It’s not a question and just…rude.
A few minutes later, when Alex drops off Henry’s coffee, Henry just stares at the mug and smiles to himself.
Alex feels his face get warm; they’ve probably cranked up the heat again.
Apologies again, Henry has written on the bill when Alex picks it up, a few minutes after Henry’s already out the door. The coffee is untouched—oh fuck, he ordered tea, didn’t he—but there’s still a ten-dollar tip sitting there.
:
The following week, Alex is taking Margot’s order when he sees Henry being seated. Henry gives him a tentative smile and an aborted wave, and it’s oddly endearing, so Alex gives him a bro-y head nod in response. After a month’s worth of misguided fury, he’s almost kinda sorta looking forward to talking to him again. Maybe he'll ask about the notebook. But when he looks for Henry after the dinner rush, he’s already gone.
OCTOBER
Henry is early the next week, hours before dinner time. It’s three p.m. and the lunch rush is gone, which means the smokers and half the kitchen are out in the small back alley, and Alex is left to handle whoever comes in. There’s only one table of stragglers left, college kids Alex is pretty sure he’s seen on campus, when Henry is seated at one of the small booths.
He remembers the tea this time, so he brings the hot water and a tea bag when he heads over a few minutes later.
“Hey,” he says as he drops the water and mug off.
Henry looks up from his phone. “Alex. Hello.”
“You’re here early.”
Henry raises an eyebrow. “Am I?”
Alex realizes it sounds a bit strange to know Henry’s schedule after only working a handful of shifts, so he doesn’t address it. Instead: “So what are you writing?” he asks as he gestures to the slightly-worn leather notebook already set out next to him.
Heny glances at the notebook, swiftly closes it, and doesn’t say anything for a moment. “Oh, nothing important. A short story or two.” He pauses. “Well, a bit of poetry.” Another pause. “Er, essays, I suppose.” A third pause. “I guess I’m not quite sure yet.”
“Huh,” Alex says, almost to himself. Henry being a writer of maybe poetry and/or maybe short stories and/or maybe essays doesn’t seem all that surprising to him. It fits his view of Henry, even though he doesn’t fully know what his view of Henry is.
Henry seems to be pretty invested in whatever it is he’s writing throughout the rest of his meal, so after he drops off his lasagna, Alex lets him be.
:
“Isn’t a library better for writing?” Alex asks him next week. “Or even a coffee shop?”
Henry looks startled, like maybe he forgot where he was. His carbonara is half-eaten next to him. “I’m sorry,” he apologizes immediately. “Do you need the table?”
“No, no,” Alex assures him. “I just think about it every time I see you writing.”
Henry blinks at him, and Alex suddenly wonders if he misspoke. “Oh.” And then: “Do you?”
Alex shrugs. He just happens to be an observant person; it’s not that weird. “I mean, you’re just the only person I know who goes to a small Italian restaurant to write. I feel like that’s what campus libraries are for. At least that’s where I go when I need to write.”
Henry smiles, closes his notebook, and puts his pen down. “You’re in school?”
“Yeah,” Alex says, defensive. “I’m not a full-time server.” Not that being a server is a bad thing; it’s just that if Alex chose to do something full time, it would be something he was better at.
(He should make sure he brought garlic bread to table two. Or five. Or six. Or any of his tables, honestly.)
“What are you studying?” Henry asks.
He decides to slide into the booth across from Henry. His tables are probably fine. Who needs garlic bread anyway. “Law. Second year.”
“Really?” Henry says, immediately interested. “Why’s that?”
Alex is a bit intense about law, so he proceeds to tell Henry all about his gerrymandering home state of Texas; and his politically-active parents (minus the divorce; Henry doesn’t need to know about all of that); and his part-time-journalist, part-time-garlic-bread-enthusiast sister; and his disillusioned-campaign-staffer summer gig; and his Poli Sci undergrad class. Henry’s got his chin on his fist with a bemused smile by the time Alex’s finished.
“Sorry,” he apologizes with a grimace. “I’m just…passionate.”
Henry’s smile doesn’t leave his face. “Don’t apologize. Seeing your enthusiasm is…” he pauses. “It’s inspiring, really.”
“Oh.” Alex feels his face get warm under Henry’s gaze, so he looks away. “It’s not—I mean, it’s not a big deal or anything.” He moves to slide out of the booth.
Before Alex can make a quick exit, Henry quietly says, “Thank you for sharing all of that with me.”
“Yeah, sure. Uh. Thanks for listening, I guess.” He hurries away without meeting Henry’s eyes.
He feels off about the whole interaction, and when June casually tells him she took care of his tables with no undertones of annoyance, he wonders what he’s missing.
It’s not until he’s wiping Henry’s long-abandoned table that he realizes Henry never answered his question. A smile crosses his face when he realizes he can just ask him again next week.
:
“So what’s your beef with libraries?” Alex asks without preamble. Henry’s not technically supposed to be his table, but he told Nora he’d switch sections, so it’s fine. Granted, she immediately said no when he presented his request-slash-demand, but he booked it to Henry’s table before she could get there, so there wasn’t much she could do.
He brings the garlic bread with him and sets it down on the table. He’s not supposed to bring it before Henry actually orders, but Alex is feeling generous tonight.
Henry doesn’t have his notebook open yet—he hasn’t even had the chance to sit down, really—but he still looks like he’s caught off-guard. “Pardon?”
“Why do you write here and not at a library?” Alex says. He doesn’t sit across from Henry this time because he wonders if maybe that was a little weird. Instead, he just leans his hip against the table and waits expectantly.
“Oh,” Henry says. “Libraries in the area tend to fill up with campus students.”
“Okay? And?”
“And…it gets a bit awkward when my students are milling about trying to discuss a grade or next week’s lecture.”
Alex stares at him. “You’re a professor.”
“No,” he says quickly, “Well, an adjunct,” as if that’s not equally as hot.
Wait. What.
Alex doesn’t have the time to dissect that whole train of thought, so he just says, “So, fuck. You’re smart then.”
Henry looks flustered, which Alex finds kind of charming, and Jesus Christ, he needs to figure out the adjectives he’s associating with Henry because they’re strange as hell, and he doesn’t like the tight feeling in his chest.
“I’ve…worked hard,” he allows.
Alex gives him an appraising look. “Huh. Okay. What's wrong with a coffee shop then?”
Henry shrugs and begins to fiddle with the menu as if he doesn’t know it inside and out. “It’s difficult to write.”
“Oh, right, because Spaghetti Special night at a local restaurant is so conducive to writing.”
“People here tend to be focused on the food and the company,” Henry says, still pretending to peruse the menu.
“As opposed to…?” Alex asks.
Henry gives a hesitant pause. “As opposed to people who like to start a conversation and ask about any weekend plans.”
Realization hits Alex and he laughs. “Oh my god, you have to go to a hole-in-the-wall restaurant so people won’t hit on you.”
He shifts uncomfortably. “That is certainly not what I said.”
But Alex is still laughing. He slides into the seat across from Henry after all, and says, “You have to go to a restaurant full of families and old people so that you can write without getting hit on. Oh, what a tragedy.”
“Oh like you have room to talk,” Henry says, finally meeting his eyes. “I'm sure you have your fair share of admirers. How many women do you take home each week?”
Alex wants to be offended at the implication that he just goes home with every customer who hits on him, but he’s still too amused at Henry’s predicament to care. Plus, he hasn’t slept with anyone since his brief thing with Nora a few months before he started working with her.
“This isn’t about me. This is about you. How many women do you take home each week?”
Henry stares at him for a beat too long, like he’s thinking very hard about what he says next. “I don’t take women home ever, in fact.”
Alex looks at him skeptically. “Oh, sure, you’re fucking Saint Henry, then?”
Henry is still staring at him. He sticks his chin out slightly as he repeats, “I don’t take women home.”
It only takes a few seconds for Henry’s meaning to sink in, and Alex realizes what he says next could affect the trajectory of their tentative-friendship-slash-whatever-this-is forever. Eventually, he settles on “Margot Two is going to be devastated,” and keeps a casual tone, as if Henry hasn’t just opened himself up in a very vulnerable way. “The things I’ve overheard her saying about your thighs are almost poetic.”
Henry visibly relaxes at Alex’s lack of reaction. “Years of polo,” he says with a smile.
That makes sense, Alex thinks, because once she started rhapsodizing about them, Alex had a hard time not looking at them, and yes, they definitely seem like polo-playing thighs.
Alex smiles back at him and the whole moment feels charged and electric and weird, so he clears his throat. “So.”
“So,” Henry repeats, watching him carefully. “Tea, please. And I’ll try the chicken cacciatore, I think.”
“Chicken cacciatore,” Alex echoes, still smiling. “Sounds good.”
He slides out of the chair reluctantly, and when he drops off the chicken marsala ten minutes later, he sees his smile reflected on Henry’s face.
:
“So. You’re English,” he says, pulling out the chair across the table and dropping into it, just as Henry takes a bite of his risotto.
Henry swallows, and Alex actively watches him do it. He never paid attention to what Henry looked like when he swallowed before. Is that a normal thing to notice? He doesn’t think he’s ever paid attention to anyone swallowing before, outside of Mr. Roberts enjoying his last half-spoon of cheese. That was more out of ‘when is it safe to present more cheese’ and less ‘that sure looks attractive.’
“Indeed,” Henry says. He glances over to his notebook and subtly closes it.
“And you’re in New York why?”
“Do you know, when you speak to me, it sounds like you wish you weren’t? I wonder if I should request another server. One who is polite and remembers to bring bread.”
Alex doesn’t tell him that he’s not technically supposed to be his server, but he swiped the table from June before she could protest. “Fuck off, I bring you extra bread with your meal and you know it.”
(This is, in fact, seldom true.)
“Insulting your customers and inferring they should return to their home country is surely frowned upon?”
Alex rolls his eyes but can’t hold back his smile. “I just mean why are you here? I feel like there are better Italian restaurants closer to your home. You know, like. In Italy.”
Henry’s smile turns a bit lopsided. It’s cute, and Alex kind of wants to press his fingers to the corner, to the place where it’s a bit pinched. He’s focused on that exact spot, and it takes a few seconds to pull his gaze away and hear what Henry is saying. “I was a bit under my Gran’s thumb. I wanted—needed—to see what it was like to be a normal person.”
“Normal?” Alex asks, eyebrows raised.
“I grew up with French tutors and piano instruction and horseback riding and sailing lessons and…” Henry explains, trailing off.
There’s a wistful look on his face, and Alex wonders if he even remembers he’s still there. The pinched corner has disappeared, he notices.
“And I just wondered what it would feel like to…choose things. On my own.”
It’s possibly the most open Alex has ever seen him; Henry’s face is a combination of honesty and vulnerability and innocence, and Alex feels a wave of protectiveness wash over him. He’ll likely never meet this Gran, but the more Henry talks about her, the more Alex kind of wants to clothesline her.
He learns about Bea, Henry’s older sister who he clearly adores. There’s a shared sense of otherness with the two of them, Alex can tell, but there are things Henry doesn’t say. Alex doesn’t press; he can wait.
He learns about Philip, Henry’s older brother who he seems to have very complex feelings towards. On one hand, Philip seems determined to understand his younger brother after years of refusing to try. On the other hand, he seems like a giant bag of dicks.
He sort of learns about Henry’s mother, but she doesn’t seem to play a significant role in most of his stories. He’ll wait to hear about her, too.
And he doesn't so much learn about Henry's father as much as he just hears bits in between the rest. It doesn’t feel like the type of thing to talk about over a table stained with coffee mug rings, and Alex vaguely considers inviting Henry somewhere where they can talk about more things—real things—but he has to wipe up the first layer of orange soda for the Martinez family before their lasagna is ready.
He reluctantly gets up and slides the chair back under the table. Henry still looks a bit wistful, and Alex wants to, like, hug him. Or maybe lace their fingers together. Or anything that tells Henry ‘Hey, I’m here when you need someone.’
“I’m here,” Alex says, out of absolutely nowhere. “You know, if you need someone.”
It’s easily the fucking weirdest thing he’s ever said to a table, but Henry doesn’t exactly feel like just another table anymore.
Henry stares at Alex and nods slightly. There’s something he wants to say, Alex can tell. But when he gives a simple, “Thank you,” Alex knows that wasn’t it. He doesn’t know what Henry wants to say to him, but from the way Henry watches him, he knows it’s something heavier than ‘thank you.’
Alex wants to say something heavy, too, but he can’t tell what.
:
Hunter works the next Thursday, which threatens to ruin Alex’s whole night. He doesn’t usually work Thursdays but when he does, Alex wants to punch him in his know-it-all, pretentious, WASPy mouth.
Henry is seated in Hunter’s section, who obviously hasn’t worked enough Thursdays to learn the unspoken rule of ‘Henry’s table is Alex’s table,’ because he heads to Henry’s booth while Alex is still serving drinks to a bachelorette party in the usually-empty second dining room of plain tables with no atmosphere.
“I got table seven, man,” Alex says as he gets Henry’s tea and pre-meal garlic bread ready.
“What?” Hunter asks, giving him a look. “No way. Henry’s a good tipper.”
Alex pauses with the tea in hand. No one’s pushed back on Henry in a long while. “I got it.”
“Dude, he tips like forty percent and he’s in my section.”
Alex opens his mouth to say something, but he doesn’t have the words. Technically it’s Hunter’s table and there’s nothing Alex can really do about it. Even so, when Hunter tugs the hot tea out of his hand with a ‘thanks, man,’ Alex has multiple, detailed fantasies about locking him in the storage room for a week with only uncooked noodles and expired sardine tins for sustenance.
He’s busy for the rest of the night, actually forced to be attentive to his tables without Henry as a distraction—and especially without the absent June and Nora there to overcompensate for his deficiencies.
When Alex is in the middle of taking the dessert order for a birthday party, he sees Henry sliding out of his corner booth, grabbing his phone and notebook. They make eye contact, and he gives Alex a small smile and a quick wave as he heads towards the exit. A wave of irritation washes over him when he realizes he didn’t even get a chance to say hello—he is legitimately going to shove Hunter’s face into a pan of their homemade ranch dressing—but it’s not like he has a choice. Even Alex, as mediocre of a server as he may be, knows he can’t just walk away while a table is actively speaking to him.
At the end of the night, after Hunter is long gone and the restaurant is all but empty, Alex has a brief conversation with the host and asks her to spread the word.
It’s the last night Henry is ever seated in a section that isn’t Alex’s.
NOVEMBER
November is, well. November is nice. Three Thursdays in a row of Alex bringing Henry tea and then sitting with him while his other tables are inevitably neglected. Three Thursdays of bringing Henry whichever pasta dish Alex chooses at random when he forgets everything Henry says outside of detailing his day. Three Thursdays of sitting across from him while Henry eats and June or Nora take care of his neglected tables.
Three Thursdays of feeling wired and giddy when Henry says, “Well. Good night.” He takes a little longer to gather his notebook these days—which, Alex has noticed, is harder to shut now that most pages have been filled with his neat, crisp handwriting.
“Good night,” Alex always says back.
He’s in a good mood after that, and he’s pretty sure that June and Nora only take care of his tables because he spends the rest of his post-Henry shift doing everyone’s side work and breaking down the salad bar and cleaning the soda machine and doing whatever shitty, gross chores no one else wants. June and Nora always disappear at the end of their shared shifts, but it’s a nice trade-off. They cover for Alex when Henry is around, and he covers for them anytime he’s not.
:
They’re closed for Thanksgiving, which he completely forgets about until his mom texts him to confirm he won’t be flying home. As much as he misses his family, and as alluring a trip home would be, a flight to Texas for three days isn’t worth the hassle of a layover and the prospect of an empty bank account. He stays home and works on a paper, and around dinner time he absently wonders what Henry is doing. He also wonders if asking for his number would be weird. They’re not exactly friends, more like weekly acquaintances. Acquaintances who talk to each other and laugh with each other and share inside jokes and discuss casual-acquaintance-y things like childhood divorce, cancer wards, and generational trauma.
Yeah, it’d probably be weird to ask.
DECEMBER
They’re short-staffed but Alex doesn’t particularly care. It’s almost closing time and all of his tables have already paid their bills. He hadn't seen Henry for the entirety of Thanksgiving week, so he's content to listen as Henry brainstorms his newest short story. Alex sits across from him in the booth and decides he'll just stay a little late to take care of everything he should be taking care of now. No one seems to give him shit for briefly sitting with Henry anymore, so he's in the clear.
“Normally I have the ending in my head before I even begin,” Henry says, hand atop his closed notebook, “but this time I can’t decide if they end up together or not.”
Alex scoffs. “You’re not going to give them a happy ending? That doesn’t sound like you.”
Henry looks away, a sad smile on his face. “Not always a happy ending, is there, though.”
“I mean, you’re in control of the narrative. You can give them a happy ending if you want.”
“There’s something to be said about a tragedy, no? Unrequited love and heartbreak.”
Alex frowns at him. “You okay, man? You’re surprisingly dark today.”
Before Henry can answer, the bartender calls out for him. “Can you grab this to-go order?”
He lets out a long-suffering sigh because can’t she see he’s with a table? Nora never makes him help out when she works a bar shift. But he grudgingly gets up. “Give me a sec. Be right back.” He heads to the kitchen and grabs the only to-go order sitting on the line, then heads back out the In door that leads to the back of the bar.
“Order for Becca?” he asks the woman standing on the other side of the bar counter.
She smiles. “That’s me.”
“Ten fifty.” He hopes he doesn’t come across as short; he just wants to help Henry work out the rest of his story.
“Keep the change,” Becca says with a wink as she hands over a twenty-dollar bill. She pauses and then, “I know it’s super forward but you’re hot and it’s my birthday, so. Do you want to meet up at Martini’s once you get off? A bunch of friends are heading there as soon as we eat some mozzarella sticks and fried ravioli.” She gestures to the bag sitting on the counter.
“Oh,” Alex says. He takes a good look at her and notices the little black dress, the heels, and the carefully-applied makeup. She’s beautiful, and he’ll probably have an exciting night if he takes her up on the offer. It’s been a while since he’s had a night out. Or since he had an actual drink that wasn’t served from the bar he’s currently standing behind, usually something out of a box labeled Boxed Red Blend Wine Drink. He’s been told they’re not legally allowed to call it wine.
Becca looks at him expectantly and places a hand on his arm.
His skin prickles, but he’s not sure why. It’s not like being hit on is new for him; he’s been given a hastily-written number on a napkin more than once, and it's certainly not the first time a customer has placed a well-manicured hand on his arm. But something feels off this time. He can’t place it. She’s pretty and he’s single, so why does something under his skin feel restless?
For a reason he doesn’t understand, Alex turns slightly and looks over to the dining room, specifically towards Henry’s table. Their eyes meet immediately, but only for a moment. Henry quickly looks away, an unreadable expression on his face. He fumbles with his wallet, and Alex watches as he pulls out several bills, placing them next to his half-eaten pasta.
Alex suddenly feels panicky, and he can’t figure out why his stomach feels heavy or why his heart rate has picked up.
Henry heads for the door and offers Alex a small, strained smile as he passes the bar.
“Henry—” Alex says, his arm pulling away from Becca’s hand as he moves to leave the back of the bar.
“Work emergency,” Henry says weakly, holding up his phone, as if he somehow magically got a call in the last five seconds. As if Lit adjunct professors routinely get nighttime emergencies.
“Hey—” Alex tries again. But Henry’s out the door.
Alex blinks. What the fuck just happened? Why does he feel like he just did something wrong? Why does a hand on his arm feel wrong? Why did Henry leave so abruptly? Why did Alex want to stop him?
Why didn’t he?
Becca’s voice brings him back to the present. “So is that a yes?”
“Oh,” Alex says again, meeting her eyes. She really is beautiful. He should say yes. It’s been too long since he said yes. And why shouldn’t he? “Not tonight. Sorry.”
“Tomorrow?” she asks hopefully. “It’s my birthday all weekend.”
He offers an apologetic smile. “I’m sorry, I really am. It’s just…” he trails off. It’s just what?
Thankfully she doesn’t press. “Your loss,” she says with a playful wink. She grabs her purse and smiles brightly as she picks up the bag of deep-fried appetizers. “Have a good night.”
But he doesn’t have a good night. He’s irritable, and when a few stragglers come in just before close, he’s even more distracted than usual. He forgets their drink orders in the fifteen seconds it takes to walk from the table to the computer, and he forgets to bring their extra marinara even though they ask twice.
(Although to be fair, it could be unrelated to his mood. He is definitely bad at his job.)
By the time the table leaves, it’s well past closing time, and everyone in the kitchen is gone. The cooks and bartender left an hour ago, so it’s just him and June doing the final walk-through.
“What is your deal?” she asks him when she turns off the vacuum. “You’ve been scrubbing that same table for, like, five minutes.”
Alex stares down at the spotless table. “I don’t know,” he answers. Because he doesn’t, and he hates not knowing. There’s an equation to be solved, but he can’t figure out the missing part. Or what he’s even trying to solve for, really.
He’ll ask Henry next week. Whatever’s going on in his head, it’s fine. He’ll talk to Henry and everything will be fine.
:
Henry doesn’t show up on Thursday. For the first Thursday since Alex began working in the restaurant, Henry doesn’t show up.
Everything is not fine.
:
June begs him to take her Wednesday shift so she can meet a deadline, and he might be a terrible server but he’s not a terrible brother. He has his own deadlines, but his brain also hasn’t stopped running for almost two weeks, and he could use the distraction.
It’s relatively slow, so that’s good, but Hunter works on Wednesdays, so that ruins the night a bit.
No. No, wait, what ruins the night is—
Alex blinks as his eyes connect with the back of Henry’s head being led to one of the small tables in the corner. He’s not sure how to process what he’s seeing, so he does the first thing that comes to mind. He makes a list:
One: This is not Henry’s usual night.
Two: That is not Henry’s usual jeans/sweater combo.
Three: He, whoever he is, is not usually sitting across from Henry.
“Table eleven is yours, Alex,” the hostess calls in a singsong voice, head briefly popping through the swinging doors.
Of fucking course it is.
Alex steels himself, takes a deep breath, and heads over to table eleven.
“Hello, my name is Alex and I’ll be your server tonight,” he starts, monotone. Henry’s head shoots up and he gives Alex a wide-eyed, panicked look. “Can I start you off with any beverages?”
“Oh. Alex,” Henry says. “I—”
“We have coke products,” Alex continues, as if Henry hasn’t ordered hot tea every time he’s ever set foot in this establishment. “And our drink specials are on the insert if you’re looking for something different.”
“I’m not looking for something different,” Henry says, looking a little confused, and Alex almost bites back ‘kinda looks like you are,’ but it feels like a weird, nonsensical thing to say, so he clenches his jaw.
“I’ll have a lemonade please,” Henry’s date says with a smile, completely oblivious to the tension between his server and his date. Ugh, he’s polite. It would be so much easier to be annoyed with him if he wasn’t polite.
Henry is still staring at him with wide blue eyes. “Tea,” he finally says quietly. “Tea, please.”
“Coming right up,” Alex says with a bright smile.
He grabs a lemonade and hot tea from the back and grits his teeth, though he can’t quite figure out why. He smiles pleasantly when they order and when he drops off the garlic bread he most certainly did not intentionally burn and when he delivers the check. It’s a long night of smiling pleasantly.
It’s fucking torture. He hates every minute of it. Every time Alex checks on them, Henry’s dumb date is doing things like touching Henry’s hand or saying ‘thank you’ or smiling or using a napkin. He’s the worst.
Alex spends most of the night leaning against the bar, watching them irritably. June and Nora aren’t around for him to complain to, so he has to stew in his bad attitude by himself. He’s mad but he doesn’t know why, though he can tell the answer is just out of reach.
(He’s also incredibly self-conscious. He’s discovered a wide stripe of spaghetti sauce on his shirt that somehow wraps around his entire torso, obtained only God-knows-how. It has a slimming effect, but Alex doesn’t want to be wearing a marinara belt around Henry’s date.)
He gives Henry a pleasant smile as he leaves and Henry’s date gives him a genuine smile back, and Alex hates everything. He walks up to the host stand as they leave to watch Henry out the front window.
“Does he bring dates here often?” he asks the host, only because he’s curious and for no other reason.
“Who?” she asks, popping some bubblegum and wiping off menus.
“Henry,” Alex says, gesturing to the regular customer who just left and who she just sat less than an hour ago.
“Who’s Henry?”
He shakes his head to himself. “Never mind.”
It doesn’t matter if Henry brings dates or how many or when. Why would it matter? It definitely doesn’t matter.
:
The next day, Alex spends the entire first part of his shift wondering if Henry will show up, or if he’s just decided to swap his Thursdays for Wednesdays. The thought makes his stomach twist, but he refuses to look too closely into it, especially when he gets three tables in quick succession. And when he sees Henry being led to a side booth in his section, he refuses to look into the relief that floods through him, too.
“Hey,” he says as he walks up to Henry’s table with his hot tea.
“Hi,” Henry replies with a smile. “How are you, Alex?” His voice is casual, like he didn’t just see him yesterday while on a date.
“Long time no see,” Alex says conversationally.
“Hmm, yes,” he replies, smile pinched at the corner.
“So. Do anything fun last night?” He’s definitely making it awkward, but he doesn’t much care. He’s never been one for a filter.
“Erm, no. Early night after I—after we saw each other. And you?”
“I didn’t know you had a boyfriend,” Alex says by way of an answer. He can hear the tightness in his voice.
“I don't have a boyfriend,” Henry says immediately. They share a long look before finally breaks the silence. “Gnocchi tonight, I think.”
Alex stares at him before nodding. “Cool. Be back with your salad.”
He replays the entire exchange while preparing his salad (and forgetting the bread). It’s easy to do; it was a short enough conversation.
“So you left in a hurry last time,” Alex says as he sets the salad down next to Henry’s closed notebook. “Everything cool?”
“Yes, sorry,” Henry says, looking away. “I hope I didn’t keep you from—I hope you had a fun night.”
“I mean, I ended up snaking a drain because everyone was gone and you weren't here so, yeah, sure. Great night.”
Henry’s eyes dart back to Alex’s. “Oh.” Alex waits for him to say something else. Explain why he left. Tell him why he didn’t show the week after. He doesn’t.
“Well. Guess I’ll just. Check on my tables.”
Henry offers a pleasant smile. “Sure.”
Okay, so apparently that’s how they’re playing it. Fine, if Henry wants to act like everything is normal, like he wasn’t just here with a date last night, or that he wasn’t a no-show last week, or that he didn’t bail without a proper goodbye the week before that, then fine. Alex is more than happy to play along.
It’s fine. Alex brings him his food and refills his water and brings him a to-go container and drops off a check, and everything is fine. It’s all fucking fine.
Instead of sitting across from Henry and asking about his day or whatever he’s writing in his notebook, Alex spends his night more or less taking care of his tables and leaning against the wall by the kitchen doors, counting down the minutes until closing time. The de facto holiday party officially starts as soon as the last customer leaves, and Alex is ready to consume an entire box of Red Blend Wine Drink by himself.
He doesn’t glance over to Henry’s table every three minutes. He doesn’t watch Henry stare at his notebook blankly or play with his pen absently. He doesn’t wonder what Henry’s thinking. He doesn’t watch Henry out of the corner of his eye as he packs up his things just before closing time.
Before he leaves, though, he makes a detour and walks up to Alex cautiously. “Have I done something?” he asks quietly, standing a safe distance away. “Again?”
Alex opens his mouth to say something, but the words don’t come, and Henry stares at him expectantly. Alex's brain stumbles over words: what he wants to say (‘Where were you last week and why was it not here and do you like that guy’), what he should say (‘Sorry I didn’t toast your bread’), what he definitely shouldn’t say (‘Can you not bring dates here please and thank you’). But before he can figure out which words win, June sidles up to them.
“Henry, you’re staying right?”
It takes a few beats for Henry to tear his eyes away from Alex’s.
“Staying?”
“For the company Christmas party!” she says, and Alex wonders if she’s already had a drink or two. Her last table left over an hour ago, and she’s probably gotten a head start while Alex pouted against a wall.
“Oh. I don’t work here,” he says, then cringes. “Obviously you know that. I only meant I should have left an hour ago, I apologize. I didn’t realize it was almost closing time; I’m sure you’ve got cleaning, and—”
He starts rambling, and Henry being flustered does something to Alex’s stomach.
“Stay,” June says again, a little louder. Yeah, she’s definitely had a Cosmo or four. “You won’t be the only regular here.”
“No, I couldn’t,” Henry says before gesturing to himself and his pressed jeans and cashmere sweater. “I’m hardly dressed for a Christmas party.”
“Henry, I’m wearing my work uniform,” she says, insistent. “Alex has about fourteen stains, and he’s going to be here.”
“Fuck you,” Alex says before looking down to see a myriad of leftover food and/or drink stains spread across his shirt. There is somehow a garlic butter stain covering the entirety of his right nipple.
Henry finally meets Alex’s eyes again. “I don’t want to impose.”
June tries another argument, but Henry is watching him, and Alex simply says, “Stay.”
Henry nods and swallows thickly. “I’ll stay then.”
Alex debates asking any of the questions he wants to ask, but he also doesn’t want to push. He’s about to consume a fair amount of alcohol, and Henry is going to be there while he does it, and it’s probably not the best time to poke. So instead, he leads Henry to the darkened second dining room where several of the servers and cooks have already started to celebrate. Ms. D’Amico has even set up a mini DIY bar cart with liquor and champagne, which means they all get to be a little classier than Wine Drink tonight.
“Sorry about your bread,” he says as he sets Henry up with a glass of champagne. “I forgot to toast it.”
“I hadn’t noticed,” Henry says. “But don’t worry. I find the incompetence endearing.”
“Okay, fuck you,” Alex says with narrowed eyes. “Serving is actually super hard.”
“Oh, I’m sure it is.”
Alex can’t tell if it’s genuine or sarcastic but it makes him laugh anyway. Everyone thinks Henry is so sweet and polite and posh, and he wonders what they would think if they saw this Henry. Although, honestly, he doesn’t want them to. He likes having it for himself.
Almost two hours fly by without Alex even noticing. He’s nearing the end of his second whisky, listening to Henry talk about sailing or polo or tennis or maybe a combination of the three, when June is suddenly in his space, tugging Henry away. “Stop hogging him, Alex.”
“I’m not hogging him,” he argues, although maybe, yeah, kinda. He hasn’t left Henry’s side all night. Or Henry hasn’t left his. Or both.
Whatever, they’re having a good time, and June can find her own friends. But Henry allows himself to be tugged, and Alex isn’t about to latch onto his free arm and fight for him.
(He’d win, for the record.)
So he refills his glass and watches Henry with Nora and June. They’re all laughing about something, and instead of being annoyed about being left out, he enjoys the chance to stare at Henry. Not in a creepy way, just in a way that he doesn’t get to do in the middle of his shift while he’s forgetting about refills and dropping meatballs. He notices things he doesn’t always get to notice. Like—Henry has good hands. Just objectively, they’re nice hands. And his mouth is very…symmetrical. Just objectively. And his shoulder-to-waist ratio is…impressive. Objectively.
Maybe no more whisky.
He gives June a few more minutes before he decides to grab Henry back. He wonders if he comes across as borderline possessive, but the soft smile Henry gives him makes it worth it.
Another hour flies by before he sees Henry’s still-full champagne glass placed next to his closed leatherbound notebook at one of the empty tables pushed against the wall. “I’m not gonna, you know, steal your stories or whatever.” He gestures to the book as he pulls away from the doorframe and into Henry’s personal bubble.
“What?” Henry asks, amused.
“It’s just—you get so strange about it sometimes. You shut your notebook in a hurry like maybe you think I’m about to run off with it and publish it myself.”
“Do I?” he says evasively.
“You do—oh.” Alex looks up to see mistletoe. Who put mistletoe there? How long have they been standing under it? “Mistletoe,” he says with some suggestive eyebrows. It’s a joke; obviously it's a joke, but Henry stumbles away as soon as Alex points it out. He wants to be offended that the idea of kissing Alex has him running away, but he’s a little distracted by Henry's mouth. It’s objectively a good mouth.
Henry’s eyes widen, and Alex realizes he might have been talking about Henry's mouth out loud.
“I should—probably—it’s late,” Henry says, and he’s no longer looking at Alex. Instead, he’s grabbing his notebook and jacket off the table.
“Wait, what? Why?” Alex’s smile falls. They were having fun; he doesn’t want Henry to leave already.
“I hope you have a wonderful holiday,” he says quickly. “Thank you for everything.”
He’s headed towards the door so quickly that Alex almost has to jog to catch up. Goddamn Henry and his long fucking legs. “Hey. Henry, wait!”
"It’s late, Alex," Henry tells him as he walks through the main dining room, now long empty, and he doesn’t slow his pace. “Enjoy your party.”
“I would enjoy the party if you would just slow down, Jesus fuck.”
Henry hesitates as he opens the front door. “Please, Alex, it’s late and I’d like to get home.”
“You told me you live across the street,” Alex huffs out as he catches up to him. “What’s going on?”
Henry blinks, and Alex suddenly realizes how close they’re standing. He keeps misjudging the appropriate amount of personal space with Henry.
He doesn’t move away, though. He should probably move away. Henry opens his mouth to say something, and the moment feels unbearably charged. Alex waits. He needs to know what Henry is about to say. There's a distant crash followed by a bunch of laughter, and Alex hopes it wasn't the liquor cart. He's not in the mood for Wine Drink.
It breaks the moment, and there’s suddenly air where Henry was just standing. Alex hovers in the open doorway alone, watching as Henry legs it to his car. Without conscious thought, he’s following him.
“Henry, what’s going on?” Alex asks. "One minute we’re talking and the next you’re running away? Did I do something?"
Henry groans and stops in the middle of the sidewalk, his back to Alex. “You can’t ever leave well enough alone, Christ.”
“Just tell me,” Alex says, and something like fear grips him. “Are we cool?”
“Are we ‘cool ’?" Henry echoes, finally turning to face him.
And something snaps in Alex. He’s not sure if it's the booze or the build-up of the past several weeks, but the words come pouring out.
“Yeah, are we cool?” he repeats, deliberate. “You’ve been super weird and I don’t know what I did. You bailed out of nowhere when I was talking to a customer even though you and I were in the middle of a conversation. And then you just completely didn’t show up for a week, and June said you always show up, so what the hell. And then you went on a date, which, like, fine. Cool. You do you, but you could have at least told me about him because we’re supposed to be friends, right? And, like, why a Wednesday? You’re supposed to come on Thursdays. You never bring dates in on Thursdays, which, you know, keep not doing that, but—”
Alex doesn’t register Henry briskly walking up to him until he feels fingers in his hair and thumbs against his temple and—oh. Henry’s mouth. On his mouth.
Henry’s mouth is on his mouth, and it takes Alex several seconds to catch up. They’re kissing. This is a kiss. Henry is kissing him.
And then Alex is kissing him back. He leans into it, and it’s—God. He’s never had a first kiss like this. He’s never had any kiss like this.
But just as quickly as Henry had grabbed his head to pull him in, he pulls away, and Alex stumbles forward. They stare at each other, and Henry’s eyes are wide and panicked.
He chokes out an apology and then turns on his heel to jog to his car. Then he’s gone, and Alex is left staring at his taillights as the car pulls out of the parking lot and disappears.
Okay. So.
What.
:
Henry doesn’t show up on Thursday. Of course he doesn’t fucking show up.
To make everything worse, it’s the week between holidays, so the restaurant is dead the entire night, aside from the people at the bar probably gearing up to make some bad decisions before they officially resolve to stop making those same bad decisions, which means Nora is too busy to talk to him. It’s for the best because he should deal with his brain on his own before dragging someone else into it.
He has no orange sodas to mop up, no cheese shaker to replace. Instead, he’s allowed to do what he’s been refusing to do since the party. He’s steadfastly ignored the kiss for an entire week. His mom and Leo had flown up from Texas over the weekend to spend Christmas with them, and his dad flew into town the day after that. Nora stayed with them since her parents were off doing something on an alpaca farm in Ohio, so Alex was able to pass the time by spending the week with his favorite people and working on assigned readings for some winter classes and scrubbing the apartment any time he had a minute by himself.
He sighs as he sits on the counter by the cold storage to wait for a table.
So.
He’s—he doesn’t know what he is. He knows so many words, and yet none of them seem to come to him. He’s upset Henry ghosted him, that’s for sure. It seems like a shitty thing to do to a friend (are they friends? Do friends kiss friends like the way Henry kissed him?) after pressing their mouths together and grabbing his hair and making him feel things.
And truth be told, he’s still a little salty about last week, like Henry switching nights is some sort of betrayal. He’s kinda hurt that Henry’s clearly dating some dude and just never mentioned it. (Or—are they dating? Would Henry kiss him the way he kissed him if he was dating someone?)
And he thinks about a couple of weeks before that, about how being hit on right in front of Henry made him feel wrong and itchy. He’s borderline embarrassed that he didn’t want Becca’s hand on his arm while Henry’s more than fine playing handsies with a date.
Under all that, the thing he can’t get past, is the jealousy he—
Oh.
He’s finally able to put a name to the feeling: jealousy. He was fucking jealous. Henry was on a date with someone who wasn’t Alex, and he was jealous.
He thinks maybe it should be a little more of a surprise to finally understand what’s been going on, but it's not. Alex’s felt a pull towards Henry since the first second he saw him, and that pull most certainly hasn’t been platonic. He’s thought about Henry’s hand in his. He’s thought about Henry’s mouth on his. And if he gave himself some time to think about it, Alex could probably get some mileage out of Henry’s mouth on other places.
Because Henry’s mouth on his was, well. It was nice. He would be on board with it happening again. He would very much like for it to happen again, in fact.
Because he wants Henry. He very very much wants Henry. And maybe Henry wants him.
He only has one table the entire night, and despite the maelstrom in his head, he manages to bring them the right dressing, the right meal, and the right drink. He even remembers the bread.
When his shift ends, barely two hours after getting there, Alex orders a Boxed Red Blend Wine Drink from Nora and drops unceremoniously onto the only empty stool, all the way against the far wall, and he stares at the strip of floral wallpaper. He’s not ready to go home yet; he still has some things to figure out. Spiral incomplete. He has not quite leveled up.
He thinks back to his best friend from high school, thinks about Professor Luna from his first-year Ethics class, thinks about the hot feeling under his sternum when he hears Henry laugh.
Bisexual. That’s probably the world he’s been stumbling over. Then he remembers Henry’s mouth on his and how badly he wants to do it again, and yep, it’s definitely the word he’s been trying to place.
He’s still on the stool nursing his wine drink, nearing the tail-end of his late-night bisexual crisis, when Nora appears in front of him. Alex looks around and sees the bar is now mostly empty. “Are you okay?” she asks with a raised eyebrow.
With no preamble or explanation, he immediately says, “Henry was on a date a couple of weeks ago.”
“Ah,” she says, tone neutral. “And?”
“And,” Alex says, swallowing. “I didn’t like it.”
She’s quiet.
“And then last week, he—maybe kind of… kissed me.”
She says, “Huh. Okay.”
He hesitates. “And that—that I did like.”
“Alex, if this story is not heading in the direction it’s needed to go for, like, two fucking months, I swear to God. I’m not technically allowed to interfere or I lose—”
“I think I have a thing for Henry,” he interrupts before losing resolve.
Nora lets out a relieved sigh. “Thank you. I only had three days left in the pool.”
That brings him up short, and he forgets what he was going to say. “What’s that supposed to mean?”
“It means that this realization has taken you, like, three months too long to figure out, and my window in the betting pool is coming to a swift end.”
“You bet on this?” he says, narrowing his eyes. “What the fuck, Nora.”
“Don’t look at me,” she says, “It wasn’t my idea. But who’s going to turn down a chance for four hundred bucks after the holidays.”
Alex chokes on his wine drink. “Four hundred? Who all is in on this?”
She shrugs. “June has the official sheet somewhere. Big Mo is going to be pissed. She had last week.”
“How did customers get involved?”
“I almost feel bad for the hosts, too. They all pooled together and chose next week.”
“The hosts?” he asks, mouth hanging open. “Nora, they’re minors.”
She scoffs. “Dude, don’t think for a second they’re innocent. They play dirty.”
“They. Are. Minors.”
“I know Henry’s table is always your table, but do you think you miraculously have room every week during the busiest night of the week? Or have you not figured out they leave an empty table until he shows up? Or make him wait until one of your tables leaves?”
“I—” he starts. But yeah, the odds of one of Alex’s tables being open exactly when Henry comes in every week are pretty low. “Look, I don’t have time for this. Can you please help talk me off a ledge? Henry kissed me and then fucking ghosted me.”
“I mean, there’s a fifty percent chance he’s spending the holidays with his family, Alex.”
He mulls that over, but he thinks about Henry’s controlling grandmother, his borderline-absentee mother, and his stiff battery-operated brother, and doubts that’s where he’d go. “I don’t know. It sounds like he’s happier here than there. I just think he’s avoiding me.”
“Not everything is about you, you know.”
“It kind of is, though. You literally just told me there’s a restaurant-wide wager about me.”
She shakes her head to herself and lets out a deep sigh. “Fifty bucks says he went home.”
Alex eyes her. “I think you might have a gambling problem.”
“What can I say; I’m on a roll,” she says with a shrug.
Nora is pretty useless after that. She tells him to wait it out. It’s not like he has any other choice.
JANUARY
Henry doesn’t show up again the following week, and Alex is now half paranoid Henry will never be back and half pissed that Henry is going to keep ghosting him for however long he fucking feels like it. In the course of a week, Alex’s moved from ‘Oh I finally get it now,’ to ‘What the fuck, Henry.’
Alex doesn’t like feeling powerless, and Henry having full control of when Alex can say all the things he wants to say is making him feel a bit reckless.
He hates having to start a new year like this. Not knowing what Henry is doing or thinking, why Henry did what he did, why he bolted after he did what he did. Alex wants to talk; he wants to finally deal with this head-on, and he hates this waiting garbage. He’s like a bull in a china shop, and Henry’s not around to let him into the fucking store.
Why the hell did he never ask for Henry’s number? Why didn’t he ever give Henry his?
The host seems to be avoiding seating people in his section, like she thinks he’ll be extra bad at his job tonight, and he doesn’t mind. Instead, he spends most of the night at the garlic bread station, aggressively buttering rolls until he has nowhere else to put them. He moves on to silverware after that. No matter how many forks he scrubs, though, he can’t stop thinking about Henry. What his hands look like when he’s writing. The smile he gives Alex every time he comes in. His mouth and how it curves into a smile or pinches in the corner or feels on Alex’s.
‘What if’ plays on a loop. What if he didn’t let Henry pull away? What if he grabbed him by his sweater and made him finish what he started? God, he wants to do it again. He’s spent a full week thinking about doing it again. He wants to be aware this time: aware that he’s being kissed, and aware of how he feels.
He moves on to organizing the dry pantry, which no one asked him to do, but he’s going out of his mind. As he forcefully stacks rigatoni, he realizes the paranoia is starting to win out over the anger. He’s pissed Henry’s completely bailed and left him to stew in the shitshow aftermath of last week’s bisexual crisis, but he’s also just scared he’ll never see him again. What if this is it? What if Alex has fallen head over heels for a memory?
He has options, probably. He can ask the hosts to do some digging online. Maybe he could backtrace Henry’s credit card information—or wait, maybe he could just check out a bunch of Lit classes on Henry’s campus—
In the haze of his anger-tinged paranoia, he realizes that what he’s doing is usually referred to as ‘stalking,’ so he decides to just start mopping the floor and inwardly recites the state capitals.
It doesn’t much work, but at least the floor is clean and the bread is buttered and the silverware is polished and the pantry is alphabetized.
(The mini fridge in the back that holds the extra dressing has been wide open—and will remain so overnight—but casualties are inevitable.)
:
When Henry walks through the door the following week, Alex is standing behind the bar keeping Nora company, and in his overwhelming relief of finally seeing him, he almost leaps over the counter to perform a flying tackle. What holds him back is not professionalism or dignity or even the missing space required for a running leap, but instead the two people trailing in behind Henry. The woman is petite, only made more prominent by an oversized leather jacket and chunky Docs. She’s got a vague resemblance to Henry, and when she looks around and says, “Oh how lovely!”, Alex hears the same polished English accent.
The man following behind them is very, very…beige. Not clothing-wise; he’s wearing a deep blue sweater and navy pants, but he has the vibe of beige. A plain toast, cream of wheat, steamed cauliflower vibe. “Very…quaint,” the man says as he takes in the restaurant, staring first at the hodgepodge tiles on the bar, then at the faded wallpaper backsplash behind it. Alex is immediately defensive and narrows his eyes; only he's allowed to be critical of outdated wallpaper.
Alex realizes immediately this must be Philip and Bea.
“Henry, what the fuck,” Alex says loudly and without thought.
Nora elbows him, annoyed that he’s not even trying to be professional, but there are only three people at the bar: two deeply invested in an argument about 90s rap music, and Big Mo, who is, in fact, quite tiny, and has seen Alex do things far worse than drop an F-bomb.
“Seriously?” he asks as he weaves his way out from behind the bar. “Seriously?”
“Alex,” Henry says, ears already pink. “Hello.”
“‘Hello’?” Alex echoes. “Three fucking weeks and it’s ‘hello’? What the fuck?”
“Oh. Yes, well—”
“How many?” says Jordan out of fucking nowhere. Jordan is arguably worse at their job than Alex is at his, spending the entire shift scrolling through TikTok in the kitchen at a volume that suggests they are wholly unconcerned with a) other people and b) customers patiently waiting for a table.
Naturally, of fucking course they’re attentive the one time Alex needs them to be playing on their phone so he can corner Henry and ask him, once again, ‘what the fuck.’
“I have it, Jo,” Alex says. They shrug, look completely unimpressed, and walk back into the kitchen. Alex, meanwhile, walks straight up into Henry’s personal space until it’s too close to be considered professional boundaries. And, one final time, he says, “What the fuck, Henry.”
“Three,” Philip says, in response to a host who is long gone. “Party of three.”
Alex ignores him and stares at Henry, who struggles to maintain eye contact and says nothing. He goes back and forth between refusing service and shoving him against a wall, but settles on the neutral, “Sure. Right this way.”
He grabs a few menus and then leads the three of them to a booth in the back, the only one left in Alex’s section. He inwardly pours one out for the other five tables in his section who will most certainly be receiving subpar service for the remainder of Henry’s meal.
Alex watches as Philip and Bea take in their table: the faded green faux-leather upholstery, the hanging light with one missing bulb, the cracked tile wall. Bea looks at it with intrigue and delight, but Philip seems perplexed and suspicious.
“What can I start you off with to drink?” Alex asks Henry in his most ‘we need to talk about your tongue in my mouth but maybe not around your siblings’ voice.
They answer him but by the time he takes the four steps to the server’s station around the corner, he’s already forgotten, so he settles on three hot teas. He grabs some hot water and tea bags but pauses when he hears voices from the table.
“It’s certainly…eclectic.”
“Do shut up, Pip,” Bea says.
“It’s not an insult, Beatrice. Merely an observation.”
“Your observations certainly sound like insults,” Henry interjects. “And you’re the one who demanded to come here. I’ve a stack of takeaway menus we could have used instead.”
“Pardon me for wanting to see where my brother spends his free time. I’ve yet to hear about the first draft of your manuscript, so I’d like to see where he wastes—er, passes—his time.”
Henry lets out an aggrieved sigh.
“And where is this man I heard you discussing with Bea?” Philip asks abruptly, and Alex immediately stiffens from his hiding spot.
“Oh my God,” Henry says under his breath, so quiet that Alex can barely hear it. “Look at the menu. The last thing I want in this godforsaken world is questions from you about men I know.”
“I’d hope not the man at the bar who waved to you,” Philip continues with a condescending sniff, and Alex wonders if blatantly ignoring things his siblings say is just, like, ingrained in his DNA.
“Philip, he’s in his sixties.”
“Yes, well. I don’t always trust your judgment. If memory serves, you once fancied a uni professor—”
“The Burrata salad is excellent,” Henry tries.
“Not the man who sat us?” Philip continues. “He’s so profane. And…American.”
Alex hears a sharp bang and a yelp, and he can only hope someone shoved his face into the table. Not the padded seat, but the actual composite wood Alex scrubs every night. “Was that necessary? I’m simply saying—”
“Stop saying anything,” Bea interrupts.
Alex peeks carefully around the wall to see Philip rubbing his knee and Henry staring upwards, a pained expression on his face, probably wondering what he did to offend an uncaring deity. Alex takes that as his cue.
“I’ve got some hot teas,” Alex says as he approaches the table, making sure to really emphasize his Texan drawl for Philip.
They all look up, Bea with a knowing grin, Philip looking distressed, and Henry looking like a deer in headlights. His ears are pink and he still seems to want to look anywhere other than at Alex. He's nervous, and he wonders hopefully if that means Henry has maybe been as fixated on the kiss as he has.
Philip seems to clock Henry’s expression at the same time. “Oh, Christ,” Philip says quietly to himself, shooting his brother a disappointed look. “I bloody knew it.”
“Alex,” Henry says. “Nice to see you.”
“Yeah, it’s been a while,” Alex says pointedly. “Almost like you were avoiding me—uh. Us. The restaurant.”
He swallows and glances at his siblings. “I went home for the holidays, actually. A brief visit.”
That deflates Alex a bit. He should have known not to bet against Nora.
“Oh. Well. Still. It would have been nice to hear from you after…”
Henry stiffens. Bea pretends not to listen to their conversation as she flips through the menu, while Philip squints at things and quietly asks himself questions like ‘What is a fried ravioli?’
“Yes, I know,” Henry says finally. “I should apologize. Can we—talk later?”
Alex very much wants to tell Henry he can talk to him right this damn moment, but he also recognizes that Henry is taking his siblings to a place he clearly cares about, and maybe he should let them be. As badly as he wants to talk to him, Alex also knows he’s waited this long and he can wait another hour.
He brings them salads with the right dressing and remembers bread and serves meals he’s almost completely certain are the ones they ordered, and he even brings a dessert menu, despite the fact he’s getting restless and just wants to send them away.
“I believe Henry mentioned sponge cake,” Philip says, eyes scanning the dessert trifold.
“I absolutely did not,” Henry says. “Why would—”
“This is an Italian restaurant,” Alex tells him. “We have spumoni and tiramisu. The end.” There are technically a few more options than that, but Alex is impatient to get Henry alone.
“No dessert,” Henry tells him. “Just the bill please.”
Alex can’t bring it to them fast enough. Once Henry’s paid and they’re ready to go, Alex looks at him expectantly. “Can we talk?”
“I—” Henry starts, hesitant.
And just, no. No fucking way. He hasn’t waited an entire night to learn the answer to ‘What the fuck, Henry,’ only to watch Henry leave as soon as he’s gotten the check.
So: “There’s a problem with your card,” Alex says. “If you could just come with me for a moment?”
He sighs. “There’s nothing wrong with my card, Alex. You’ve just run it.”
Alex glares at him. “Henry, I swear to God, if you leave this restaurant without talking to me, I will tape myself to your car. I will be a sexy, angry hood ornament.”
Henry considers him for only a few moments before turning to Bea and Philip. “I’ll meet you at the car.”
Philip stands stiffly and dusts off invisible crumbs from his irritatingly-pressed khakis. “Yes, well. It’s—this was—I—.” Everything comes out stilted and awkward, like maybe his operating system is malfunctioning. Alex doesn’t have time to make a joke, though, because he needs Henry alone, like, five minutes ago.
“I’m so glad we had a chance to meet,” Bea fills in for him, sliding out of the booth and giving him a bright grin.
“Oh God,” Henry mutters. Alex wants to be smug about the fact that Henry has clearly talked to his siblings about him but. Well. He doesn’t have the time.
They both move to leave but Philip hesitates and gives Alex a long look. He opens his mouth a few times but then immediately shuts it. “Henry seems…in good spirits,” he settles on eventually.
Bea is still smiling at Alex. “Henry seems happy, is what he’s trying to say.”
“Will you both please leave,” Henry grits out.
Without another word, Bea loops her arm with Philip’s and tugs him towards the door, but Alex has forgotten about them as soon as they’re out of his direct line of vision.
Alex doesn’t cast a backwards glance; he grabs Henry’s wrist and drags him to the darkened, empty second dining room. He pulls maybe a bit too forcefully than he needs to because Henry’s certainly not putting up any resistance.
Once he’s hauled Henry to the far corner, Alex turns to face him. “Give me your fucking number.”
Henry stares at him, eyes wide. And yeah, that probably came off a bit unhinged, but Alex’s not concerning himself with things like rational behavioral functions right now.
“I’m so fucking sick of you ghosting me, okay. Give me your number, and the next time you, like, fucking kiss me and then disappear for weeks—”
“I was on another continent, Alex—”
“—then I’ll have your number,” he finishes. He narrows his eyes. “And don’t you dare leave me on read.”
Henry swallows, undoubtedly second-guessing his life’s choices. But when Alex hands him his phone, Henry dutifully adds his number without hesitation.
They stare at each other for a few moments. “I should—er.”
Alex is on the clock, at least three of his tables have spaghetti specials rapidly cooling in the line window, and he’s still unclear on exactly how Henry feels about him, but. No time like the present.
He grabs Henry’s face with both hands and tugs him down, crashing their mouths together. Henry lets out a startled noise but the surprise fades quickly, and he’s suddenly kissing Alex back. Technically this is their second kiss, but this one—
This one is everything.
Alex only breaks the kiss when he registers the insistent bell ringing from the kitchen. Henry leaves their foreheads pressed together, and for a few moments, Alex considers quitting his job just so he can yank Henry by his sweater and press him into the nearest table to do all the dirty things running through his head.
“You should probably go,” he finally—reluctantly—says.
“Right,” Henry says, not making any effort to move.
“I don’t want to get fired,” he says. But he makes no effort to move either.
“Of course.”
He can hear June muttering on the other side of the wall as she looks for him, and Alex knows their time is up. He pulls away and stares at Henry for a few seconds before saying, “I’m going to finish this shift and you’re going to charge Philip’s batteries, and then you’re meeting up with me to do that again. Understood?”
“Yes. Understood.”
Alex stares at Henry’s mouth before finally turning away and heading back to the kitchen. By the time he’s dropped off the probably-cold spaghetti to his three tables and brings the probably-wrong dressing to the other two, Henry’s long gone.
He can’t keep the smile off his face.
“Why is your face doing that?” June asks him, suspicious. “Wait, no. Don’t tell me. And I’m not going to ask why you were MIA for ten minutes.”
“Let’s just say—”
“I literally just said don’t tell me.” She shoves a washcloth at him. “Go scrub whatever it is you defiled.”
He takes the washcloth into the second dining room but he doesn’t wipe anything; instead he whips out his phone.
i’m taking a break at 9
That’s…nice?
What is the appropriate response here?
be here at 9:01
make a left at the dumpster and go through the gate
Alex, I can’t just leave the two of them alone in my apartment.
you live like five minutes away and i only need you for 15 min
give them your netflix password
i can do a lot in 15 minutes
and henry, i’ve put some thought into the things i want to do
I’ll see you at 9.
The next two hours are easily the slowest two hours Alex has ever worked. He’s ninety percent sure he forgot to add cheese tax and even more sure he gave the Margots at least two free drinks. But being a good server has never been lower on his priority list.
At 8:59, he heads out to the dining room and finds June talking to Nora at one of the side booths. “I’m taking a break,” he tells her. “If you need me, I’ll be out back. But I would suggest not needing me.”
“That’s where the smokers go,” June tells him with narrowed eyes. “You’re not a smoker.”
Alex gives her a defiant look. “You’re not my boss. You don’t get to tell me what I put in my mouth—”
“Alex, if you finish that sentence, I will murder you in your sleep.”
He doesn’t have a lock on his bedroom door, so he shuts up. “See you in fifteen!” he calls out as he heads back to the kitchen, inching closer to where Henry is hopefully waiting for him.
“Public indecency is illegal!” she hisses after him, even though a family is sitting a few feet away at table nine. “Don’t get arrested until we find your replacement!”
Alex weaves his way through the front line, past the dishwasher, in between the tables in the prep cook area, and through the storage area, until he’s at the back door leading to the small, gated back alley of the restaurant. Henry is waiting. He looks nervous and unsure, hovering inside the gate.
“You came,” Alex says as he closes the metal door behind him. The smokers have gone home, so there’s no one around to see him walk up to Henry and pull him by his wrist to a small alcove barely deep enough for one person, much less two. He presses Henry against the brick wall and keeps his hand firmly planted against his sternum.
“Alex,” he says, eyes wide. “We’re in public.”
“Okay, first? It’s January and the lights in the parking lot have been out since the eighties; it’s pitch black. Second, the smokers are gone; no one is here. Third, there’s a gate—”
“Which is unlocked.”
“—that blocks anything, and fourth.”
After a long pause in which Alex doesn’t continue, Henry asks, “Fourth?”
“Fourth,” Alex repeats, leaning in close until they’re a breath away, “I really want to blow you.”
Henry blinks. “Oh. I.” He hesitates, weighing Alex’s arguments. “Yes. Carry on.”
Alex hasn’t ever done this before, but he’s certainly given it some thought since that kiss. A lot of thought. He fumbles with Henry’s belt as he drops to his knees, and the gravel stains on his knees will go quite well with the crouton crumbs on his thighs, firmly glued on with ranch dressing adhesive.
Despite Alex having never done this, Henry doesn’t last long. Alex would be smug about it, but he’s so turned on that he feels like he might die. Henry has to push Alex’s hand away from where he’s palming himself through his pants so he can haul him up and return the favor.
It’s easily the most intense orgasm he’s ever had in his life, but he knows it has nothing to do with the fact that anyone could have seen—or heard. It has to do with Henry.
Alex tugs him back up as he catches his breath, and leans up to kiss Henry as soon as he remembers to inhale and exhale normally again.
God, he likes kissing Henry. He could do this all fucking day.
Eventually, their breathing evens out and Alex rests his head against Henry’s. “So do you—”
“Yes,” Henry says immediately.
Alex smirks. “I didn’t even finish my question.”
“Oh. Right,” he says, ears going pink. “Continue.”
“What did you think I was going to say?”
“Alex,” he groans. “Just ask what you were going to ask.”
“No, now I want to know.”
Henry takes a deep, pained sigh. “I assumed you were going to ask about…this,” he says, gesturing between them and the wall and the general vibe of blowing you in a back alley.
Alex frowns. “I mean, sure. I assumed that was on the table. But what I was going to say was…” he trails off because what if that’s all Henry’s thinking? What if his endgame was blowjobs on his server’s break? Is he doing this for free garlic bread?
But he thinks of Henry’s eyes on him when Alex was being hit on, about the overheard conversation with Philip, with Henry’s gentle-but-insistent hands in his hair during their first kiss. Their garlic bread isn’t that good.
“What I was going to say is—do you want to do this again, but, like, after dinner? Somewhere that isn’t here?”
Henry swallows. “Yes,” he says on an exhale.
“Yeah?” he asks, and he can physically feel how quickly the smile spreads across his face.
He nods. “Yes. I could use a change of pace. The service here is truly dreadful.”
“Fuck you,” Alex says, laughing. He wants to be incensed but a) fair, and b) he doesn’t care enough, not when Henry’s face is so close to his. He closes the gap, pressing their mouths together again and waiting only long enough for Henry to catch up before he decides to make it a bit dirty. They can’t go again, but Alex isn’t above trying anyway.
“I…like you,” Alex says, resting their foreheads together. “Just to put that out there.”
Henry smiles. “I like you, too.” He tries to pull back, but Alex grabs his hips and doesn’t let him go far. “I am sorry, you know. I shouldn't have kissed you.”
Alex stares at him blankly. “I'm very bad at blow jobs if that's how you read what I just did to you.”
“Well, I shouldn't have kissed you then ran away,” he amends. “It was unfair.”
“Okay, that I’ll give you.”
“I shouldn't have ran when I saw you and that woman at the counter, either; I’m sorry about that, too.”
It’s Alex’s turn to pull back a little, making sure he has Henry’s full attention. “That wasn't anything. You know that, right?”
“I know, but I was already—in a bit deep by then, and I didn't think I could handle watching you…seeing you leave with someone else.”
It’s almost funny, the idea of Alex having eyes for anyone else. Henry thinking Alex could have eyes for someone else after all these months. But: “I mean, I get it. Seeing you on a date was seriously not fun.” He grins at Henry. “Can you apologize for that since you're apologizing for everything else?”
He groans. “I didn’t know you’d be here. What a bloody nightmare that was. As soon as we left, I told him I had feelings for someone else, and we called it a night. I shouldn’t have agreed to it in the first place. I was just—well.” He doesn’t finish. He doesn’t need to.
“Yeah,” Alex says, resting their foreheads back together. “Me too.”
Table three probably needs their check, and table four definitely needs water refills, but someone—probably June—will hopefully take care of it. Some things are more important than a twenty percent tip.
DAY AND MONTH IRRELEVANT
Despite being absolute shit at his job, Alex can honestly say that his first six months at D’Amico’s were fun. He likes who he works with, loves the customers, and feels surprisingly at home amongst the floral wallpaper and faulty lighting. Plus, he fell in love, so. There’s that.
But his last six months are even better.
He doesn’t really need Henry to keep coming to the restaurant; they spend plenty of time together outside of it now. There are dates at restaurants Alex does not work at, make-outs in places that are not back alleys, and clothing removal unrelated to marinara spills and rogue dishwater. But he still visits occasionally, usually during especially difficult writer’s blocks. And for someone who seems so straightlaced and proper, he sure doesn’t mind fostering Alex’s newly-discovered exhibitionist side.
Spring break comes and goes. Instead of spending it somewhere tropical to drink margaritas for a week, he spends a week at Henry’s apartment. There’s a lot of making out and very little clothing.
When Alex is restless during finals week and needs to take a break from textbooks, Henry hands him his leather notebook, looking uncertain. Alex has subtly hinted at it more than once, and he suddenly understands Henry’s hesitancy and skittishness when he figures out some of Henry’s words are about…him. There are some beautiful stories, a few sad ones, and some borderline-pervy poetry.
“You wrote about me?” Alex asks him. They’re sitting next to each other on Henry’s couch, a container of linguini on the coffee table, and he looks up in surprise to catch Henry rolling his eyes.
“Yes, you numpty; why do you think I was always so jumpy?”
“I don’t know,” Alex answers honestly, a few things starting to click into place. “I just thought you were, you know. Weird.”
Henry sighs. “Christ, you’re daft.” He undermines his words by tugging the notebook out of Alex’s hands, placing it on the table, and then shoving him backwards. He climbs onto Alex, draping himself until every part of them is touching. His brain is briefly a tangle of Henry’s beautiful stories and his pervy poetry until Henry is tugging at his waistband, and then it short circuits altogether.
Summer comes and goes, too. There’s really no pretense anymore; Alex has just fully moved in and given up his probably-safety-code-violation-sized bedroom in his sketchy off-campus apartment. The decision is especially easy after he hears Nora making noises from June’s room that will probably give him waking nightmares. Well, that and getting to see what Henry looks like every morning.
Alex puts in his notice a few weeks before his final year resumes. His shifts are mostly boring now that Henry is at home waiting for him in bed instead of in a booth waiting for bread. On the plus side, he’s gotten better-ish at his job. When he tries to accuse Henry of being the reason he was such a godawful server, Henry doesn’t even dignify it with a response.
His last day is bittersweet, especially since Henry shows up around seven p.m. and orders dinner for old-time’s sake—but it’s certainly not the last time Alex serves him a plate of pasta.
Now, brandishing a plate of manicotti while he’s almost fully naked isn't a health code violation. Now, in the privacy of Henry’s study, Alex can drop to his knees after he drops off a mug of hot tea, and he won't get them arrested for public indecency. Now, he can inelegantly sit on Henry’s lap and convince him to take a break from writing, and he won’t get fired for sexual harassment. Now, when Alex spills God-knows-what onto his shirt, Henry can carefully undress him, nudge him into the shower, and do dirty, dirty things to him.
And if Alex starts accidentally getting spaghetti sauce on his shirt, well. Henry doesn’t need to know.